Yankees News: Tanner Scott silver lining, former coach passes away, Marcus Stroman

On Sunday, just before we were treated to a wonderful slate of football, most baseball fans were immediately thrown off when the Los Angeles Dodgers made another splash in free agency. It was yet another move that affected the New York Yankees in some way.

LA signed Tanner Scott to a four-year, $72 million contract. Scott wasn't a target of the Yankees due to his elevated price tag (and the fact they already have two closers), but the Dodgers got better while the Yankees continue to sit around and look to shed money before making their next investment (we'll get to that in a bit).

But there is a silver lining with the whole Scott situation. Before he landed with the Dodgers, three of the Yankees' division rivals were pursuing the electric left-hander. All of the Boston Red Sox, Toronto Blue Jays and Baltimore Orioles were looking to sign him.

According to one report out there, the Red Sox offered more years and a higher AAV, but he still said no in favor of LA. That was later deemed inaccurate, but you'd have to think there were some other competitive offers since all of those teams still have money to spend.

In the end, if the Dodgers can do the Yankees any favors, it's steal players/targets from their rivals to make their path in the AL simpler. We'll take that.

Yankees News: Former coach Jeff Torborg passes away

On Sunday night, it was announced former Yankees coach Jeff Torborg passed away at the age of 83 in his hometown of Westfield, New Jersey.

Torborg spent time during some of the dark days with the Yankees' organization, coaching from 1979-1988. But his career spanned much further than that. He played 10 MLB seasons with the Dodgers and Angels, and caught Sandy Koufax's perfect game in 1965, Bill Singer's no-hitter in 1970, and Nolan Ryan's first-ever no-hitter in 1973.

After that, he managed the Cleveland Indians, Chicago White Sox, New York Mets, Montreal Expos and Florida Marlins, in addition to his Yankees stint. The New Jersey legend had his number retired at Rutgers University for his successes while in school.

Yankees Rumors: Marcus Stroman trade is going to take a lot of work

As for the current Yankees roster, there's still an issue with how the team is going to handle Marcus Stroman. It is believed he will be traded by Opening Day, but there's largely been silence on that front as the rest of the free agent/trade markets further materialize.

The latest update, however, suggests the Yankees will have to "swallow a lot of money to make a deal happen," per Buster Olney of ESPN. It's no surprise — it's just further confirmation from executives speaking on the matter.

Stroman is set to earn $18 million in 2025 and has an $18 million vesting option for 2026 if he pitches in 140 or more innings this coming season. You'd have to assume the Yankees would be guaranteed to pay down some of his salary in 2025 and then potentially be on the hook for some of 2026 since it would be awkward for a new team to acquire Stroman and then manipulate his workload to avoid him hitting the vesting option.

It's indeed a complicated situation, and at this point it might just be smarter for the Yankees to utilize Stroman to their advantage in 2025 rather than pay him to pitch somewhere else. He was very good in the first half of 2024, so if his innings are managed properly, he could prove to be an extremely valuable back-end starter with so many other teams stockpiling arms to insure against injuries and regression.